A Wrench in the Works
by Eponymous Rose
Summary: Katie Jensen, mechanic extraordinaire, meets her counterpart on Red Team. Some things don't need translation. Minor spoilers for 13x02; written for the rvb60min challenge on Tumblr.


"Hi," he says. "I'm Lopez. Apparently I'm supposed to help you with the warped axle on this Warthog."

Okay, no, what he actually says is more along the lines of "Hi, I'm Lopez, something something something me something something car something-that-maybe-means-pencil," because Katie Jensen failed miserably every time she tried to learn another language and Spanish class back in high school was no exception.

"Um," she says. She recognizes him as one of the Reds and Blues, but doesn't know him, which means he was probably one of the people on the Fed side of the fence. She's been so busy the past few weeks that introductions have been kinda low on the priority list. "Hi, Lopez. I'm Katie. Sorry. I don't speak Spanish."

He grunts, folds his arms, mutters something.

"But you understand English, huh?" She brightens. "Wait, no, hang on a sec!" It takes her a moment to shuffle out from under the Warthog and dig up her pack, but right at the bottom is the ancient little datapad, and she crows victoriously when she finds it still has a bit of charge. "Hah! Got it!"

Lopez is still watching her, arms folded.

"Translator," she says. "If you speak real slow and clear, it's usually pretty good."

Lopez jolts, takes a step closer. He says something that the translator picks up; she shows him the word _**Seriously?**_ as it prints across the screen.

"Yup," she says. "Pretty cool, huh? And sort of a necessity if you suck at languages as much as I do. I dunno if you noticed, but everyone around here speaks like five languages and nobody wants to bother translating every time someone new enters the conversation. This baby's good at colloquialisms and everything." She blinks at him. "Wait, I mean, this tech's been around for centuries. Didn't they have something like it on your old team?"

Lopez stares at her, then says, _**That would make too much sense.**_

Katie grins. "Yeah, okay, fair enough. I know Captains Grif and Simmons, and that Sarge guy's pretty weird. Red Team, right?"

_**Tragically.**_

"Say no more," Katie says, with all the weight of several months' experience with Red Team and everything it represents. "So what's up?"

Lopez seems to shake himself, then repeats the thing about the car and maybe a pencil, only this time she gets the message. "Oh, sweet! I can always use some more help with the mechanical side of things, everyone here's pretty hopeless. You a mechanic?"

_**I'm mechanical,**_ Lopez says, then glances over her shoulder at the translation and adds, _**literally. I am a robot.**_

"Oh, neat," Katie says. She figures maybe if she gets too starry-eyed it might make things weird. Better to play it cool. "Neat-o. Neateroo. Spiffy, even. Cool beans."

_**Geek,**_ Lopez says.

Katie points a wrench at him. "Hey, I may geek out a bit at what is obviously a very advanced work of machinery, but at least I'm not that Dr. Grey lady. Whatever you do, don't let her anywhere near you with a pair of pliers. All I'm saying."

Lopez cocks his head to one side, then says, _**Noted.**_

"Who built you?" Katie blurts out. "Wait, no, is that impolite? I dunno how I'd answer if someone asked me that. I mean, my parents, I guess, never mind, that's not particularly weird, except if you think about it too much—"

_**Sarge, **_says Lopez. His interruption is even more awkward because it takes a second for the translator to settle on the right word so they just sort of stare at each other in silence.

Katie blinks. "Uh."

_**It's a long story and most of it makes no sense.**_

"I'm getting the impression that's about par for the course with you guys, really." Katie forces a nervous smile, then says, "Okay, so, axle. It's been bent, because that's all the damn things are good for. Well, that and steering and, like, keeping the wheels apart I guess. But it seems like they break down a lot and—whoa, hey, hang on a second, there's some mods in there!"

Lopez freezes halfway through the act of sliding himself under the Warthog. Katie obligingly holds the translator's mic down at his level. _**What?**_

"Mods! You know, extra fuel injectors, lots of cooling fans, more efficient power transfer, that sort of thing!"

_**Humans,**_ Lopez grumbles. _**Always messing with things for pointless reasons. Probably why you're all so bad at math and have to pee all the time.**_

"You're really not used to people being able to understand you, huh?"

Lopez pauses, then says, delicately, _**It's unnerving.**_

"Anyway," says Katie, bending down next to him to squint at the Warthog's undercarriage, "you gotta be a little careful. Can't just go bending it back into place with your kickass robot strength. If you... I mean, if you have kickass robot strength. It's cool if you don't. Although if you do, it'd be pretty cool. Kickass, I mean. Robot strength! Yeah."

_**Let's assume for the purposes of this discussion that I have kickass robot strength.**_

"Cool, cool," says Katie, who is an expert in the art of Playing It Cool. "Anyway, how about I guide and you bend? I can tell you what to avoid and when the strain's getting to be too high."

_**OK.**_

"Okay! Great. Let's do it."

They do. It takes about a quarter as much time as it would've if she'd tried to get Bitters or Palomo in here to do the same thing. She rocks back on her heels, then dusts her hands off on her fatigues and offers him a hand up. "Bam! Done. Super easy, right?"

_**That was... weirdly efficient.**_

Katie bravely resists the urge to say anything particularly cliche about beautiful friendships and their beginnings. "Hey," she says, "we got some time. Wanna take her for a spin around the compound?"

Lopez stares at the Warthog for a moment, then shrugs. _**Sure. I never get to drive these things before someone destroys them.**_

Katie grins and jumps into the driver's side, firing up the ignition mod because hey, any damage will probably just buff out anyway, right? Lopez climbs in beside her readily enough. "Seatbelt," she says, and he just stares at her.

Forty-three seconds later he's fumbling for the strap of his seatbelt with un-robot-like panic. _**Who taught you to drive?**_ scrolls across the translator she's got propped on her dash, and she hits the brakes inches before colliding with a brick wall that she's pretty sure wasn't there five seconds ago. "Uh," she says, "is that a thing people normally get taught?"

_**Oh god,**_ says Lopez, then sighs as she backs them out of their near-collision and revs the engine.

He leans forward, fiddling with the electronics under the dash. She watches him work. "What're you doing?"

He sits up straight. _**If we're going to be smashing around the city in a deathtrap,**_ he says, flipping a switch, _**there are certain regulations Red Team has concerning the importance of appropriate musical accompaniment.**_

"Musical..." Katie says, then grins as the Warthog's radio blares to life. "Is this, like, Tejano polka? All riiiiight! Let's do this!"

_**At least they'll hear us coming,**_ Lopez says, and while his voice never leaves its monotone she's pretty sure he's grinning behind his helmet.


End file.
